Sep-Oct 2002

VIDEOTECA DEL SUR en LA HAVANA
PROGRAMA
September – November 2002

DCTV | 87 Lafayette St. 
Two blocks South from Canal St. ( corner White St.) Train N, R, or #6 to Canal St. in Manhattan

 Notes from the Director 

In this cycle of historical ambiguities, hybrid cultures, which we must confront if not reevaluating its concepts, at least analyzing them, Videoteca del Sur celebrates 13 years of life. An anniversary that arrives with the confidence of having contributed to the intelectual enrichment and the knowledge of our life as a Latin Americans. Reviewing our memory-archive gives us the possibility to rediscover projects which, thanks to a combination of tenacity and patience, come true. A certain stubborn determination to spread our cinema. A determination directed towards the dignification of human beings and different socio-cultural expressions and that, finally, will empower us to continue to be valid and to prevail in the coming years.
This season you will have an opportunity to enjoy a program that offers new works, some unknown, and also classical and historic films: a unique combination that will make for a smooth analysis.

Pedro Zurita
Executive Director

FRIDAY, September 6   7:00pm

THIRTEENTH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION

A FESTA DE MARGARETTE (MAGARETTE’S FEAST)

Dir.: Renato Falcao BRAZIL 80′
Cast: Hique Gomez, Ilana Kaplan, Carmem Silva, Jefferson Silveira, Isis Medeiros, Pedro Gil, Artur Pinto, Dimitri Sanchez, Leonardo Lentino.

Pedro has a dream of giving his wife, Margarette, a great birthday party. He ignores the distance from their house to the city, the recent news of being laid off or the difficulty in receiving his unemployment money. Nothing stops him. His dream is bigger than any barrier. The cruel reality reaches him. Peter lives as he would not like to live, unemployed and without conditions to provide to his wife and family what in his dream was so real. Filmed in a surreal language, without dialogues, “Margarette’s Feast” is a portrait of the aspirations and disillusionment of an ordinary person looking for the excitement of being in the world as he would like to be, even if it’s for only one night. The Director will be present.

FRIDAY, September 13
LEO BROUWER-IRAKERE

Dir.: Juan Padrón CUBA 24′
In 1979, in Havana, the talented guitar player and composer, Leo Brouwer and the popular group Irakere, join by Chucho Valdés, Paquito D’Rivera, Arturo Sandoval, get together to play original versions of a mix between cult and popular music.

LEO BROUWER

Dir.: Juan Padrón CUBA 57′
This documentary in the style “free cinema” presents what is considered the most important genius and interpreter of the guitar of the XX century in Cuba. At same time, the documentary shows the most important events of Brouwer’s life in Cuba. The Director will be present.

FRIDAY, September 20
MILAGRO EN ROMA (MIRACLE IN ROMA)

Dir.: Lisandro Duque Naranjo COLOMBIA 76′
Cast: Frank Ramírez, Gerardo Arellano, Amalia Duque García, Santiago García, Lisandro Duque Naranjo, Daniel Priolett, Enrique Buenaventura.
Miracle in Roma was conceived as part of a six-film series called Amores Difíciles (Difficult Loves). Colombian Nobel Prize winner Gabriel García Márquez wrote the scripts, and the films were produced by Spanish television. Margarito’s seven-year-old daughter dies and his grief is overwhelming. After twelve years he finds the body perfectly preserved and his neighbors consider it a miracle and support him in his efforts to fight Church bureaucracy, all the way to Rome. Miracle in Rome is one of several faith-affirming Spanish/South American films.

FRIDAY, September 27

North America PREMIERE

LOS AMANTES DE SAN FERNANDO (THE LOVERS OF SAN FERNANDO)

Dir.: Peter Torbiörnsson NICARAGUA-SWEDEN 90′
The lovers of San Fernando is a true story about dreams, love and hope and what in the end became a reality. The film is set in San Fernando, Nicaragua, and the future seems bright. The war is over and the peace has come, and Ninoska and Tinoco are deeply in love. This is the beginning of a journey which will not finish until the night of the millennium. We follow them through the year, how Tinoco wins the trust of Ninoska’s parents and brothers and can marry her, their struggle in poverty, how the move to the coast to make a better life for themselves and their children, and how they return to San Fernando after having failed. Ninoska dreams about liberty and indigence and to get an education. The Director will be present.

FRIDAY, October 4
Q’ESHWACHAKA, EL PUENTE DORADO

Dir.: Jorge Carmona del Solar PERU 26′
Crossing the Andean landscape, the Apurimac river cuts the land in two. Following its flow, we find a challenger, with the mission of joining that break for the benefit and development of different Indian communities. This challenger is the Qeshwachaka bridge, a pre-Incan jewel that to this day continues to perform its duty of joining both sides of the Apurimac. This eternal servant kept alive by four Indian communities that rebuild it every year respecting the ancestral techniques and traditions.

BLANCO ANTIFAZ

Dir.: Ximena Pereira VENEZUELA15′
Short film. He is looking for her. She wants to find him. They wait over and over again. How far will the game go on?

LAS CUARENTAS (THE FORTY)

Dir.: Victor Vega COSTA RICA 40′
‘Forty’ was a code used by Costa Rican police to identify prostitutes. Made in 1975, this documentary introduces us to the sordid and complex prostitution’s world in San Jose. In Spanish.

FRIDAY, October 11

Exclusive presentation of EDIN VELEZ’s works

META MAYAN II

A poetic observation of the Guatemalan Highlands. Landscapes, textures, and gestures are balanced equally with portraits of the people. Time and rhythms are heightened, resulting in a synthesis of structuralist, abstract and ethnographic concerns. Beneath the surface beauty of the imagery, the reality os a country undergoing social upheaval is underscored.

MEANING OF THE INTERVAL

Shot over a period of one year in Japan, this video is one of the first examples of multiple image layering. Mythical, ritual, and commonplace elements are interwoven in a concurrent, non successive structure. Extensive use of audio synthesis and sampling transforms and layers the audio.

THIS AND THAT, AND OTHER MISUNDERSTANDINGS

A road movie about forgetting and being forgotten. Shot over a period of six years while traveling through France, Spain, Mexico, Cuba, Argentina, and Puerto Rico; it is a document of failed loves, death and how neither vengeance nor pardon can modify the past. Edin Velez will be present.

FRIDAY, October 18

Works presentation and discussion of EICTV,

ESCUELA INTERNACIONAL DE CINE Y TV from CUBA

GENTE QUE LLORA S.A.

Dir.: Hatem Khraiche 16′
In a world where emotions, happiness and sadness are bought as a service. Consuelo, a worker in the company, will see her live change, after discovering her next customer’s identity.

ENTRE CUATRO PAREDES

Dir.: Claudio Oliveira 12′
Within Four Walls. While a man is in prison, his father and his wife fall in love. After he gets back his freedom, the lovers must make a decision.

CANDELA

Dir.: Joaquín Bize 12′
A Spanish woman tourist has an accident in the road. A truck driver and his son take care of her. But they are afraid they will be blamed, so they leave the injured woman with others. This is just the beginning of a trip the woman will never get to understand.

TROPICALVOYEUR

Dir.: Pedro Michelli 12′
At a Caribbean Chinatown, He discovers his woman is part of an ilegal network of hard-core video. He will have to deal with an underworld, characterized by appearances, to find out where she is.

EL VIAJERO

Dir.: Ana Endara 10′
Helena is 10 years old and lives in a house far away from every thing. Her grandparents, also live there, but they don’t have any contact with the outside world. A Traveler arrives, wants to work for room. This meeting enlarged Helena’s view, and gets her across the fence. She would like to see those distant places. Helena will grow up to become a traveler.
Special guest from EICTV will be present

FRIDAY, October 25
CLAROSCURO

Dir.: Ray Armele PARAGUAY 10′
Based on Lourdes Espinola poems, this experimental short travels trough romanticism and surrealism, exposing women’s anguishes and illusions. In Spanish.

CUENCAS: UN DESAFIO PARA EL FUTURO

Dir.: Luis Gamboa HONDURAS 16’
A pilot project at Honduras Rio Grande’s basin motivated by the effort to make better use of nature’s resources, thereby avoiding unnecessary deforestation, contamination and burning. In Spanish.

I LOVE PINOCHET

Dir.: Marcela Said CHILE 52′
Point of view of the social and political system in Chile after Pinochet. Women and men from all social classes, who believe in authoritarian and an ultra conservative system, give a portrait of Chile. Constructed through many testimonies, it allows us to know the complexity of the Pinochet phenomenon in Chile. In Spanish.

FRIDAY, November 1
MARCADOS POR LA VIDA

Dir.: Pedro G. Llorente DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 14′
How Dominican homeless children live in the streets. At the same time, this video shows the work of “Niños del Camino”, an institution dedicated to help these children. In Spanish.

RETROSPECTIVA AL FUTURO

Dir.: Vladimir Ceballos PUERTO RICO 15′
Art documentary that makes a conceptual journey through the work of Puerto Rican artist, Jaime Romano. Shooted mostly in Vieques island and in the artist’s workshop, through interviews and his works he talks about Art and the aesthetic proposal he offers in his work. In Spanish.

PAPA IVAN (DAD IVAN)

Dir.: María Inés Roque ARGENTINA-MEXICO 55’
Dad Iván, is the testimony of the daughter of a Montonero guerrilla leader that died during combat: Iván Roque, the Iván in the title and the father of the director. The documentary exposes in a moving way the difficult relationship between a daughter and her heroic and mythified father.

FRIDAY, November 8
THE MIDNIGHT SPECIAL

Dir.: Edgar Soberón T. PANAMA 12′
An actor, witness of the Panama invasion, makes a parody of Noriega and reflects upon the night of December 20th, 1989, the day of the US invasion and capture of the strongman. In Spanish.

LA ESQUINA (THE CORNER)

Dir.: Andrés Bergmann 18′ GUATEMALA
On route to a local football match, Julio and Checha are confronted abruptly with the wonders of modern technology. With a dead battery and non-functioning power locks, the two are forced to enjoy each’s company for a prolonged period of time in La Esquina.

A TIME OF DARING

Dir. Sistema Radio Venceremos EL SALVADOR 40′
Made in 1983 by the former Salvadorian guerrilla group FMLN. Constructed as a visual essay, with very little dialogue and no narration, this film juxtaposes scenes from both sides of the battle lines: U.S. advisors with government troops, guerrilla fighters and their supporters.

FRIDAY, November 15
UN TANTITO DE SANGRE (A LITTLE BIT OF BLOOD)

Dir. Julia Barco MEXICO 15′
Testimonial documentary on virginity, the ideas women from various regions of Oaxaca have, and the role women play in the preservation of traditions.

PRIMER DIA(FIRST DAY)

Dir.: Galo Recalde ECUADOR 15′
In the fist day of classes Martin Garcia, who was moved from a private school because of an economical crisis, will learn a very important lesson in his life: to survive.

CANDOMBE

Dir.: Hassen Balut – Silvestre Jacobi URUGUAY 54′
Reflection of the Afro-Uruguayans in Montevideo, Uruguay. This culture, from African slaves and brought to the Rio de la Plata coast, at present are living in a peculiar atmosphere with music and dance. During the year, their music is based on percussion drums and their dance is made by typical characters. Distinguished personalities of Candombe are: Juan Ángel Silva, Juan Velorio, Fernando Nunes, Marta Gularte y Lágrima Ríos.

NEXT PROGRAM: MARCH 2003

Dir.: Alejandro Pelayo MEXICO 75’
Con: Ernesto Gómez Cruz, María Rojo, Salvador Sánchez, Alfredo Sevilla, Ana Ofelia Murguía, Fernando Balzaretti.
La acción transcurre en un solo día, aquel que, después de estar doce años inactivo en la vida política del país, un ingeniero espera, en compañía de algunos familiares y colaboradores cercanos el llamado del presidente electo para integrarlo a su nuevo gabinete. Estas 24 de espera le permiten al espectador reflexionar sobre el significado del poder, los políticos de una época y los de las nuevas generaciones, y sobre el nacionalismo y su cotidiano enfrentamiento con las fuerzas externas. Clásico del cine mexicano realizado en formato 16mm en 1982.

Dir.: Andrés Heidenreich COSTA RICA 92’
Con: María Chaves, Andrés de la Ossa, Alejandra Portillo, Arnoldo Ramos, Anabelle Ulloa, Marco Martín, Guisella Solís, Gerardo Arce, Ana Istarú.
Filme de suspenso que relata la historia de un adolescente y su malograda aventura en Internet. Una madre y su hija de 12 años, abandonadas por el hombre de la casa, se van a vivir con la abuela. La nueva condición social y económica, más dura, las afecta. La madre acepta un trabajo peligroso,. La hija se desahoga buscando amistades en el chat de la Internet . Allí descubre peligros inesperados al entrar en contacto con una red criminal que establece contacto con ella y la secuestra para ofrecerla en el mercado mundial de la explotación sexual.